The problem of drilling holes in timber to facilitate the accurate assembly of joinery and furniture using dowels is well known. Dowels are usually short lengths of timber which are used to join wooden sheets together. Initially, holes must be drilled into the wooden sheets and a dowel is then inserted into the hole in each sheet. Glue is usually squeezed into the hole prior to insertion of the dowel. It is critical that the holes in each sheet are precisely aligned to enable the two sheets to be properly joined together via the dowel. Even a small misalignment creates an unacceptable join. Therefore, even a minor inaccuracy in the positioning of dowel holes creates alignment problems which are not simply overcome, and are time consuming to correct or disguise.
It is well known to provide some sort of framework to enable the holes to be accurately drilled into the sheets. These devices are typically called dowelling jigs, and several devices are known. A disadvantage with many types of conventional dowelling jigs is the complexity of the device especially in ensuring that a plurality of holes can be accurately formed in a particular sheet. Other conventional devices are quite fiddly to use. Many devices are very expensive to manufacture and are therefore not readily accepted by cabinet makers and DIY people. Other conventional dowelling jigs are suitable only for forming holes in the face of the material or forming holes in the edge of the material but are not entirely suitable or easy to use to form holes both in the edge and the face of the material. Some conventional dowelling jigs are extremely large and therefore are not very useful in confined spaces or on smaller work benches.
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